Audio stutters with USB Dacs on Macbook M1 Pro

[antcollinet]

Since you seem to be one of the few M2 havers in this thread, do you think you can do a bit of testing for us?

Discussions a few pages ago suggests that this problem is isolated to the M1 devices and that M2 devices are not affected by this issue at all. Could you try artificially increasing the RAM load to your system to induce medium/high memory pressure (yellow graph in the activity monitor, which should show up at or around 29-30GB RAM usage) and see if any audio skipping shows up?

You can try either opening many professional apps at the same time or, if that's usually not your workflow, use this link https://www.trackthis.link/ and open as many Chrome tabs as you can through the system (I think 6-7 instance of 100 tabs will get you to 29-30GB RAM usage easily).

We're trying to track if this might have also been a hardware-related issue that Apple is keeping quiet about to prevent a recall.

I also have M2 32GB. I've just opened all my apps, and about 130 images in an editing app. This is what memory pressure looks like:

So far no skips after about 1/2 hour.

This is with a MiniDSP flex. No idea if the interface is UAC2 or not though.

 

[antcollinet]

Trying again - managed to get affinity photo up to 35GB

Still no skips.

What is seriously impressive - is the rest of the system doesn't slow down. Not even a little bit. Affinity is unusable, but browsing here is as snappy as ever.

 

[bellamy]

Just a bit of update on my part. I'm still using the DX3 Pro on a 16" M1 Pro with 16GB RAM. I updated my system to 13.4.1 yesterday, and while this could be a placebo effect, I've been using Apple Music for the past 2 hours down with only a skip or two at 72% memory pressure. Usually by the time I go above 70%, all audio stutters like mad.

Anyone else experienced a slight improvement in 13.4.1? I sure hope this is an improvement, even if it's not a total fix.

 

[vurt]

I'm on 13.4.1.

Using the Apple USB-C to USB dongle, plugged directly into the M1 Pro MBP with 16GB ram, then connected to Cayin RU6, to headphones.

Still stuttering. It's less often but this is no objective measurement since it's erratic.

My current memory pressure is also in the green and pretty low I'd say. If high memory pressure is the trigger, I shouldn't be experiencing stuttering with this low memory pressure.

I have to assume the Apple dongle isn't helping if stuttering is still happening. And whatever improvements—less stuttering—is either my low memory pressure or some improvement from 13.4.1.

 

[thrillho]

was able to tool around with an M2 mac mini 16GB a bit today and did not have any issues at all with stuttering. wonder if this was something that was fixed in the architecture going from M1 to M2? i'm using it the same way as my MacBook Pro M1 which stutters like crazy.

 

[pengin15]

Interestingly, I've been using beta 2 of macOS Sonoma for the past few days now, and I haven't really encountered any skips even at 14.60GB/16GB usage. Fingers crossed!

EDIT: Including, if I might add, memory usage of 15GB simultaneously playing Final Fantasy XIV. Might this be it!?

I did notice that swap usage seemed to have increased significantly compared to the previous beta and Ventura, which is a good sign. I'll take the SSD hit over getting an M2...

EDIT 2:

Right. This is actually very interesting. macOS Sonoma beta 2 goes really aggressive in using swap and just generally reducing memory pressure.

I tried opening a lot of Chrome tabs as usual and I'm actually having some trouble keeping the memory pressure yellow. Beta 1 and earlier versions seemed very comfortable with keeping memory pressure at yellow - not beta 2 of Sonoma.

Christ I can only hope that this is not merely an "error" by Apple they will be "fixing" come the next beta.

 

[thrillho]

said yolo and installed the beta on my m1 MBP and haven't got a stutter, yet

 

[Zensō]

said yolo and installed the beta on my m1 MBP and haven't got a stutter, yet

I'm tempted. Any unrelated issues with the beta?

 

[thrillho]

so far the only thing that hasn't worked was soundsource which i only had because of the stuttering (and it didn't really do much, anyway). it'll straight up tell you that it's not supported, though. i have read some people having issues with some adobe applications (lightroom in particular).

it's my work laptop for my IT university job and no problems to speak of for me outside of the mentioned. i've only been using it since this morning so that's not to say other issues won't pop up but it's been solid for me, so far. coworker told me it's way better than beta 1 was, so that's a positive.

 

[Zensō]

so far the only thing that hasn't worked was soundsource which i only had because of the stuttering (and it didn't really do much, anyway). it'll straight up tell you that it's not supported, though. i have read some people having issues with some adobe applications (lightroom in particular).

it's my work laptop for my IT university job and no problems to speak of for me outside of the mentioned. i've only been using it since this morning so that's not to say other issues won't pop up but it's been solid for me, so far. coworker told me it's way better than beta 1 was, so that's a positive.

Thanks!

 

[elvisizer]

Trying again - managed to get affinity photo up to 35GB

Still no skips.

What is seriously impressive - is the rest of the system doesn't slow down. Not even a little bit. Affinity is unusable, but browsing here is as snappy as ever.

View attachment 294733

You’re still using 4 gb of ram as a file cache heh the system isn’t even worried yet

 

[elvisizer]

I'm tempted. Any unrelated issues with the beta?

Beta 1 and 2 of Sonoma have both had lots of kernel panics when trying to wake from sleep while connected to external displays. Only other thing I’ve seen myself is some intermittent spotlight issues.
Pretty stable for the dev betas really

 

[pengin15]

Beta 1 and 2 of Sonoma have both had lots of kernel panics when trying to wake from sleep while connected to external displays. Only other thing I’ve seen myself is some intermittent spotlight issues.
Pretty stable for the dev betas really

Can confirm this too. Unplugging from sleep and going monitor-less will screw up the OS. Not to an unmitigable degree though - in my experience letting the OS run its course and not touching it for the first minute or so after logging in pretty much fixes the issue.

Also update: I still haven't encountered any skips. Things are looking good!

 

[kuil5230]

No more audio stutters after upgrading to Sonoma beta 2

 

[thrillho]

have been on it now for a full day without any issues and no stutters. hope this is the finally friggin fixed.

 

[Axo1989]

was able to tool around with an M2 mac mini 16GB a bit today and did not have any issues at all with stuttering. wonder if this was something that was fixed in the architecture going from M1 to M2? i'm using it the same way as my MacBook Pro M1 which stutters like crazy.

No—or not enough—I've certainly had the issue on M2 MBP 24GB, pretty much like everyone here is describing. These reports from people trying Sonoma beta are promising though.

 

[theREALdotnet]

No more audio stutters after upgrading to Sonoma beta 2

Is there a second beta? What is he build number? Mine is 23A5276g.

 

[thrillho]

Is there a second beta? What is he build number? Mine is 23A5276g.

that’s beta 2

 

[IHeartAudio]

I downloaded Sonoma maybe a week ago and have had my memory slammed the whole time with no skips at all. As a music lover, I'll take being on a beta that doesn't have audio skips over Ventura. I'm finally happy with my MBP. It only took a year of ownership for them to fix it.

 

[etny]

Yep, Sonoma Beta 2 seems to do the job. Better late than never... and hopefully, they won't mess it up in the final release...